Live From ..., Ratings Are Up

The savior of linear television, besides folks who simply like to watch what ever is on the tube, continues to be Live Television.  It causes appointment TV where viewers plan their time to be near the TV set to watch.  And the success of live TV can be seen as ratings continue to rise for spectaculars like The Sound of Music to Football games and to last Sunday's Grammy Awards program.  "The Grammy Awards telecast remains second only to the Academy Awards in terms of popularity, with Sunday’s show on CBS drawing a big 28.51 million viewers — up slightly from last year’s 28.38 million and the second largest audience in the last 21 years."

No doubt, I would expect more and more networks to augment their line-ups with special event live shows.  NBC has tried it already with live showing of 30 Rock and Fox has had success with American Idol.  Keeping viewers tuned to the channel also benefits the networks advertising abilities.  More viewers, more dollars charged, more revenue coming in.  But it is clear that TV needs more live programming also to keep cord cutters from growing more rapidly. 

Once networks build out an authenticated TV Everywhere experience that lets their networks get enjoyed on every screen, ratings growth could skyrocket.  So congrats on the ratings success; Live television continues to demonstrate the power that linear networks bring to the public.